First Week of March

MONDAY
OMG. (I know, it’s so juvenile to use a phrase like that in my post, but you don’t understand how crazy I’ve felt today.) I went to Starbucks this morning, and I was still feeling out of it at 10:15 a.m. I was dragging. And it didn’t help that the kids were crazy. We had a fight in the hall, a case of girl drama, and some serious hyperactivity. Fortunately, Mr. Moore (best counselor EVER) makes a regular 3rd period Starbucks run and hadn’t left yet. I got in on it and ordered another triple grande something-or-other. Resolutions (and classroom coffee makers) are for preschool teachers. This middle school teacher needs something stronger. Come on, espresso shots…


TUESDAY
Today is Tuesday, which means I have to attend an action team meeting. I hate action team meetings; they actually make me wish for full staff meetings in the library. Our action team includes four people. Two of us will sit there listening while the other two talk over the top of each other. Maybe everyone else will forget...?
No such luck. It was as bad as I made it sound, with a side of bitchiness. The two of them were interrupting each other constantly, making snide remarks about each other, complaining about everything from poor use of staff meeting time (how ironic!) to why all of the other teachers aren’t teaching exactly what these two think they should be teaching (although these two don’t agree on what that is) – can I go back to my classroom now, please???


WEDNESDAY
Today, on a complete whim, I invented a new classroom management technique that gives instant results and makes students smile. I have this student who sits in the front row on the center aisle, and he is constantly turning around in his seat, usually to talk to the girl across the aisle in the second row. When I tell him to face the front of the room, he turns his head, but his arms, torso, hips, legs, and feet are still facing the girl. Today, I go so fed up with him that I blurted out, “Do you see that lizard magnet on my filing cabinet at the front? When I remind you to face the front, I mean that your arms, body, hips, legs, feet, hands, head, and eyeballs should all be facing that lizard magnet.” He understood, but he thought it was kind of weird that I was being so specific. I tested it out a few minutes later from the back of the room by saying, “Lizard!” As this sounded slightly derogatory, I changed it to “Salamander!" the next time. Fortunately, no one seemed to mind the discrepancy between the reptilian magnet and the amphibian name I decided to use. At this point, it seems to work quite effectively. As an added bonus, most of my other students respond to the Salamander call as well by immediately turning around to face the front of the room even though they know I'm not talking to them. I might be a classroom management genius. (Or I might just be a weirdo.)


THURSDAY
Ugh… I had such high hopes of making coffee in my classroom today. Unfortunately, I went to find another teacher this morning and didn’t manage to interact with my coffee maker until after 10 a.m. My ESP class was HORRIBLE. They were out of control, loud, hyper, and definitely not reading. My first block was awful as well. I have no choice but to conclude that my students’ behavior is positively affected by the scent of coffee in my classroom. (It couldn’t possibly be because I wasn’t awake enough to manage them…)


FRIDAY
Holy crap! Today we found out that one of our seventh grade students has been skipping school. He told his mom that the school was teaching homosexuality in one of his classes, and that he was really uncomfortable in that class. She was so horrified that she allowed him to stay home for three days.

(Seriously? In WHAT CLASS would we actually be teaching that? We’re too busy prepping kids for the state math test, the state science inquiry, the state reading test, the state writing test, the presidential fitness test, the art showcase at the next school board meeting, the orchestra festival next week, and the social studies test about the Arabian peninsula, etcetera, to go anywhere near a topic like that.)

Anyway... When the school started calling his house to find out why he hadn’t been at school in three days, the boy heard the message on his parents’ answering machine. He erased the message, of course. Then he showed up at school the next day with a note for the office saying that his home phone number had been disconnected and that the school should call his mom’s cell phone number from now on if they needed anything. The note looked suspiciously seventh-grade-boy and not middle-aged-mom, so one of our secretaries called the home number anyway. The mom answered. When the secretary read the note over the phone, the mom identified the new phone number as the student’s own cell number.

This entire episode is astounding to me. I’m impressed by his commitment to his plan; I also think it shows discouragingly high intelligence on the student’s part. What’s depressing here is that he is using his brain power for evil instead of for good. He concocted this elaborate plan, but he can’t be bothered to turn in his homework or behave in class. And he showed no remorse. He didn’t learn to tell the truth, and he didn’t learn to always come to school. If anything, he learned that his next sociopathic, criminal mastermind-style school-skipping scheme needs to be more polished than this one.